A Pure Lady for the Broken Duke_A Historical Regency Romance Novel

by Hanna Hamilton

  “Yes, ma’am. Very pretty is it not?”

  “Well…” Mother continued to be uncertain about this dress.

  Claudia scooted over and sat on the bed next to her sister and took her hand. She leaned in and whispered, “Now.”

  Jenny looked at her, uncertain what she was referring to. Claudia nodded, as though she expected Jenny to understand. But Jenny did not.

  “Jeremiah,” she whispered again. “Dinner.”

  Then Jenny got it, turned to her mother, and said, “Mama, Claudia wishes to ask you something.” She turned to Claudia who looked terrified, and Jenny poked her with her elbow.

  Claudia stammered, “Ah… I ah… You know Jeremiah Wisdom… The Vicar’s son…”

  “Of course, I do. What of it?” Mother asked.

  Claudia glanced at Jenny for support.

  “Claudia wants to ask him to dinner. It seems they have an interest in each other, and she wants him to meet the family,” Jenny said to get the agony over with.

  Mother looked stunned. “Jeremiah?” Then she thought about it a moment and wagged her head. “He seems like a nice lad. And with his father being the vicar… Well, I do not see why not. But I shall have to speak to your father first. After all…”

  Claudia smiled. “Oh, thank you. When can I say he might come over?”

  “As I said, let me speak to your father first.” Mother threw her hands in the air. “I do not know. Daughters? Why do I have so many daughters? Boys are never this much trouble.” Then she left the room.

  “Oh, thank you, dear sister. I never understand how you can be so brave. I never thought she would agree,” Claudia said holding Jenny’s hand.

  “Oh, my dear, it was nothing. It is just a dinner invitation, not the Spanish Armada.”

  “But, just the same…” Claudia then asked, “Tell me about your Evan? He seems ever so nice. How did you meet?”

  “His parents sell fruit at the market. I always buy from them, and he is visiting, so we spoke.”

  “How romantic,” Claudia sighed.

  Jenny could not admit to that as of yet and said, “We shall see. He lives far away, and we have only spoken a few times.”

  “But he is so handsome… and such a gentleman.”

  “My darling sister, there is more to a marriage than that.”

  “You can be very cold-hearted, Jenny Barnett,” Claudia said with a pout.

  Jenny laughed and patted Claudia’s hand. “But you are only seventeen.”

  Claudia sighed. “You say that like it is a problem.”

  “Not a problem, but believe me, as you grow older, things will look differently to you than they do now.”

  Claudia stood. “Oh, I hope I never become cynical like you.” And she flounced out the room.

  Chapter 8

  Helena was finally able to arrange a meeting with George for tea at her Aunt Rosemary’s. It had been two days since she had had her tête-à-tête with Thomas, and she was bursting to discuss the latest developments.

  She arrived early at her aunt’s, and George had not yet arrived. She was ushered into the drawing room where Aunt Rosemary was seated smoking a pipe with her feet up on an ottoman.

  Rosemary had lived in Morocco for many years when she was married to Sebastian Broadbent, the Deputy Counsel for the British Ambassador to the Moroccan Kingdom.

  “Helena, your Georgie has not yet arrived,” Aunt shouted out as she was a little hard of hearing, though she would not admit to such a fact.

  “Auntie, I know I am early, but I have been in such a tizzy ever since my meeting with His Grace.”

  “How is the old Duke?” Rosemary asked.

  “Aunt, you know the old Duke has been dead these past seven or eight years. I am talking about Thomas, the new Duke.”

  “Ah, yes, I believe you told me that before. But I liked the old man. He had a wicked sense of humor and he was rather free with the ladies, if you get my meaning.”

  Helena adored her dotty aunt. “Yes, I do. And you should be ashamed of yourself for bringing the subject up. It is disrespectful.”

  “Well, it was only a brief dalliance. I never cared for his rather fishy breath. Put me off, and I never got over it. And, do you know, he had a webbed foot.” She seemed reluctant to go into the details. “But it made him a great swimmer, I understand.”

  “And what did your husband say about that?”

  “Oh, Sebastian was long gone before that. And, in any case, he had a rather selective palate for Moroccan street urchins. Kept him amused and allowed me to pursue my own interests.”

  Helena had heard Aunt’s stories before, and she sighed and removed her gloves, anxious for George to arrive.

  “Glass of sherry?” Aunt offered.

  “No thank you. Need to keep a clear head. George and I have some serious issues to discuss.”

  At that moment a carriage arrived at the entrance, and Helena went over to the window. “Oh, good, it is him.”

  “Shall I ring for the tea now?” Aunt asked.

  “If you please.”

  Aunt got out of her chair and paused at the door. “I shall leave the two of you alone this afternoon. I know you will behave yourselves, and I want you to have some privacy.”

  “Thank you, Aunt.”

  George came in just as Aunt Rosemary was exiting.

  “Oh, Helena, I got your note and am so anxious to speak with you.” He went over and embraced her.

  “Darling, come sit with me. Tea shall be here shortly, and Aunt has agreed to leave us alone so that we may talk privately.”

  “How very kind of her.”

  Helena suddenly felt a little shy and did not speak up immediately.

  George opened with, “You said in your note you had something important to tell me, but you did not say what it was.”

  “Yes, I know. I wanted to tell you in person.”

  George became nervous. “Has something happened?”

  Helena hung her head and softly said, “I ended up telling Thomas about us.”

  “But I thought…”

  She put her hand on his. “But everything is fine. He understands the situation and has promised not to let it slip. It is unlikely that Father will find out.”

  “But…”

  “No, and there is more. Thomas has agreed to allow us to tell Father that he is engaged.”

  “Oh… To whom?”

  Helena smiled. “He says we can tell Father it is a secret engagement.”

  “Is he engaged?”

  “No, silly. He is just trying to help us.”

  At that moment the tea was brought in and served, and they were both silent.

  After the butler left, George asked, “Then what does that mean for us? Is there going to be a public announcement of his engagement?”

  “No, that is why it is supposed to be secret. But you and I can tell him the Duke is to be married and it takes the pressure off for me to marry him.”

  George did not seem relieved. “It sounds very tenuous to me. Do you think this will satisfy your father? What is to keep him from insisting you marry another nobleman?”

  “I had hoped to have more time, but I think I can persuade him to let us marry.”

  George was lost in thought for a moment, barely touching his tea.

  “Then what do you propose we do now? Do you want us to announce our engagement to him?”

  “Not yet. Let me prepare him for the announcement. I know how to get on his good side, and hopefully, he will come around before we tell him.”

  George sat back in his chair and sighed. “I think I am happy you told Thomas. I can speak to him about us now. It was very frustrating not being able to tell him of our love. But…”

  “But what?” Helena asked. She got up from her chair, and came behind George, and placed her hands on his shoulders.

  He turned to look up at her. “Since we have been constrained by your father’s insistence on you marrying Thomas, we have never talked about what we w
ant.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “Well, first, I am still living at home. My father is quite healthy, and I see no immediate possibility of inheriting the estate. I have no job. I have no house of my own. How can we marry now in any event?”

  Helena had not thought about those things. She had just gone along with the lovely idea of being married without considering how they would get there.

  “Oh…”

  “I suppose I could find us a cottage. My living is small at this point, but I suppose I could ask Father for a larger yearly allowance.”

  Helena did not warm to the idea of cottage living. She moved to the window and played with the drapery tassel. “We might wait,” she mused. “And it would give me more time to work on Father. And in the meantime, perhaps you could get some sort of job.”

  “A job!” George exclaimed a little bit louder than he had meant to. He became flustered.

  “Many men do,” Helena said still musing.

  “But… but…” He was having a difficult time finding the words he wanted to use. “You mean commerce?”

  She turned to him. “Well, something like that. Maybe you could buy a ship or something. Cargo brings a good profit, does it not?”

  “But you need a lot of capital to buy a ship, Helena.”

  “What about railroads? I understand they have become quite the thing for investors.”

  “But all that sort of enterprise requires money. Money I do not have.”

  “Might your father help you out?”

  “His wealth is in land, Helena. He does not have capital. He would need to sell land to raise money and that would defeat our purpose. We want to inherit the land and its living, not sell it off before we can benefit from it.”

  Helena thought for a moment, then said, “Well there is my money once we marry. Might we not use some of that?”

  “You cannot touch that until we are married, and we cannot get married until we have a place to establish our life.”

  “Then what good is any of this?” she asked exasperated and went to the window. “I thought I was going to make everything better, and instead, I have made it worse.” And she burst into tears.

  George stood, went to the window, put his arm around her, and said, “Everything is going to be just fine. You will see.”

  Aunt Rosemary came back into the room after knocking. “Have you two talked everything out? I thought it best if I came to check on you.” She made her way to her chair and sat down again and picked up her pipe, knocked out the dottle and refilled the bowl with fresh tobacco.

  “Mr. George, when are you going to make my niece a happy woman?” Aunt asked.

  George seemed not to know quite how to answer that. The question was fraught with ambiguity. “I ah… well, we have been discussing the timing of our engagement. But it is not an easy path forward. You see…”

  “Young man if you want her—ask her. Beating around the bush never got anyone anywhere.”

  “But you see…” he stammered.

  “Nonsense. Is it your papa who worries you?” Aunt asked Helena. “If so tell him from me he needs to remember what it was like to be young. He has become more ossified than the barnacled bottom of a boat. If you want, I can come over and take my stick to him—set him straight for you.”

  Helena could not help giggling. “Aunt, I thank you, but I hardly think that is the best way to accomplish our goal.”

  Aunt waved her hand. “Whatever you wish. Makes no difference to me. But if you ask me, young people today have no spines. In my day we went for what we wanted. Take your uncle. If I had not taken a switch to him he would still be languishing in some miserable Foreign Office basement in a dead-end job. Still, if we had not gone to Morocco, he might still be alive. But we went there to live!” She waved her pipe in the air, struck a match, and lit it.

  George and Helena held hands, faced each other, and looked forlorn.

  “What do you suggest we do now?” Helena asked turning to George.

  “Let me speak to my father and see what he can suggest,” George said. “But for the moment it seems nothing has changed for us.”

  Chapter 9

  The Duke’s London house was modest but well appointed. The family did not use the house as much as they used to, but it was kept fully staffed, and Grandmamma Augusta did enjoy going for the opera season.

  Thomas was in London on business this trip. He had set up appointments with his solicitor and two bankers. Thomas realized he had been lax about his responsibilities to the estate. But it had become apparent that he needed to find out why the estate was losing money instead of making it. It could not be only the troubles in the West Indies. His father had informed him of the variety of their investments, and it made no sense that one part of the portfolio should cause this massive loss of income.

  He arrived at his solicitor’s office at ten o’clock as scheduled. Sir Benjamin Stockwell was happy to see him after such a long time.

  “Come in, Your Grace. I thought you might have forgotten about us.”

  “I am afraid it is my fault. I have not been attending to business as I should have, and unfortunately, I am here to discuss the state of my estate. I have not been happy, recently, with the results of our investments .”

  Sir Benjamin was an elderly gentleman whom Thomas had known since boyhood. The gentleman was stalwart and industrious, with a sterling reputation, but he was also a bit dried out, dusty, and bloodless.

  “Yes, I understand your concern,” Sir Benjamin said, directing Thomas to sit in a chair opposite his desk. “When you made your appointment, I pulled out your files, and have been reviewing the financial statements, and I can see there is a good reason to review these accounts.”

  “And have you found an explanation for this precipitous fall in income, Sir Benjamin?” Thomas asked.

  “Have you spoken to your bankers yet?”

  “My next appointments are with them.”

  “From what I can ascertain, there has been a lot of shifting of funds from one investment to another. Shares were bought and sold regularly What was your motive in doing that?”

  Thomas did not understand. “I am sorry, but I have not been moving any funds. The share accounts were set up for the interest from the investments to go into the operating account for the estate. Other than that, I have not been shifting any funds.”

  “It clearly shows in these statements that shares have been sold and moved to other accounts. But there is no way to ascertain what was behind those transfers of funds.”

  “You mean to say, that shares have been sold and the money moved elsewhere?”

  “It would seem to be so. But it is difficult to tell. There has been so much activity—both selling and buying. But I assumed it was you who made these transfers.”

  Thomas felt uncomfortable. “I am sorry to say it was not me. It seems I have been a poor caretaker of the estate business. But I am determined to find out what has been going on and to remedy the situation if I can.”

  Sir Benjamin handed Thomas his file. “These are the statements showing the activity. I trust you have your own copies which we forwarded to you on a regular basis?”

  Thomas looked at the papers. “Yes, I do have these same statements, and that is why I am here. To see what can be done about this situation. Can you assist me?”

  Thomas handed the file back, and Sir Benjamin thought for a moment or two.

  “Since we are not the transactors in these stock sales and purchases, I am afraid we can do little except to advise you on a course of action you might choose to take.”

  “Then what do you advise?”

  “Very well. First, I suggest you speak to the bankers. They are entrusted with the management of your stocks and funds. They are in a much better position to advise you than I am.”

  “And that is where I am now headed.” But Thomas had a further question. “Might there be some wrongdoing in this mess? And, if there is, are you able to help me with
legal action if it is necessary?”

  “We can certainly advise you as to that. But first, you need to uncover the extent of any wrongdoing and hopefully find out who might be responsible.”

  Thomas went directly to his next appointment at Hargrove, Smyth and Phillips private banking. Mr. Phineas Hargrove was his personal banker.